Archive for the ‘poetry’ Category

Long (enough) ago I decided to let this blog languish in internet purgatory, for all practical purposes dead to me and anyone else. Tyler Gobble, however, has given me some legitimate license to drag it up from its grave for a moment by tagging me in his Next Big Thing post, in which I’ll answer ten questions about my (chap)book and tag writers (up to five) who I’d like to see respond to the same set of questions. Here we go.

What is the working title of the book?

You Are The Meat. It is a chapbook.

Where did the idea come from for the book?

I mean, it’s poems. Poems come from all sorts of planets. Sometimes that planet is a drive home from a famous ice cream shop, sometimes it’s a Jimmy Eat World song, sometimes it’s Stevie Nicks. Several of these poems came from a series that I have a feeling isn’t done, is taking a brief nap, whose titles are abstract words that I’ve tried to focus on in some total intense whoa-ness that kinda takes that undergrad shame of like, “…so, I guess this poem is about love” and turns it into “Yeah this poem is about love and fuck it, I fucking love everything, here’s why.” Really, at this point in my life my central, “writing planets revolve around this star” goal with everything is to have that sort of total, thundering union between fragility and ferocity.

What genre does your book fall under?

Poetry

What actors would you choose to play the part of your characters in a movie rendition?

Jennifer Lawrence would play all references to music I primarily listened to in high school and my hometown prior to 2007. Aaron Paul (Jesse from Breaking Bad) is every reference to the post-industrial Midwest. Tom Jones simultaneously plays and eats a sandwich. Katy Perry and Stevie Nicks play themselves.

What is the one sentence synopsis of your book?

Slicing open your own belly with a pocketknife and landing on a continent that has never felt acid rain.

How long did it take you to write the first draft of the manuscript?

Everything in the chapbook got chopped and sewn and polished over the past three years on wildly differing timelines. Some things are not much different than their original drafts, some have emerged from a frustrating number of cocoons.

Who or what inspired you to write this book?

I mean, feelings? But really, one of the smartest things I’ve ever been told by a significant other (thank you, Tyler) is that I’m a “feeling it” writer and that I should run with that, hard. At times that’s a frustrating thing because, you know, you get that “write every day” or “schedule your writing time” thing branded into your butt from undergrad, but a simple, solid thing I remember Sean Lovelace saying during a large Q&A session at a writers’ event at Ball State University is that if you want to write, you just will. Scheduling and goals yes, establishing discipline is valuable yes, but if you ultimately don’t want to do this shit, you just won’t. That’s a comfort to me, because I know I don’t just want to want to write, I want to write. I haven’t been doing this very long but I know now dry spells are that, spells. I’ve learned to not brush off those tiny flames of feeling brought on by whatever–and sometimes they’re small, have to be fanned–and take down whatever it is that’s feeding them in the first place. That isn’t to say I never write when I’m not absolutely “feeling it,” or ascribe to, fuck no, “the muse,” because hard work and perseverance is of course vital, but I realize there’s nothing wrong with prioritizing times/moods in which my writing work is going to result in the greatest benefit for my effort, which for me just isn’t going to be every single Tuesday from 5:30 pm ’til midnight.

Safety is dead, vulture heart, sinking
ship, bullet-holed sign inked
“No Trespassing; Here Be Monsters”
growing from gravel, a tree grown
from a gravestone seed the size of
sufficient faith, tinier than mountains
of sand. Viking funerals sell one-way tickets,
and the trip is worth buckets of water.
This is not your mother’s hug before
your first day of kindergarten, this is not
a blanket of fur to incubate your quivering
heart, this is a loaded gun held in your
own hand, your wretched voice
demanding respect, sounds of awful,
hungry cries longing for the salty gash
of your piss-soaked skin. Shoot point blank,
take no prisoners, and forget, because
this place hates you and knows you
love it back.

I was totally stupid and forgot to say how I introduced readers for Jeremy Bauer’s chapbook release reading at Village Green Records tonight in Muncie before it, you know, actually happened. Goddammit. But you should buy Jeremy’s chapbook, titled The Jackalope Wars because it will cradle your heart in a fleece blanket. Order it here you damn ol’ fool.

Also, you’ll notice where you’re orderin’ dat chapbook is my friend Tyler Gobble’s new site for publishin’ things. I’m on there and HO BOY I got emotions like flittin’ insects all pretty.

After the reading I drank a Mike’s Hard and sat on a church’s concrete ramp and wrote a thing. Hm. I feel animal and hope the moon ain’t done with me yet. Let’s howl all always yes.

Today I read Dan Bailey’s Drunk Sonnets then fell asleep with Jack, the house golden retriever, whose fur smells like my winter vest or Cool Ranch Doritos depending on where you put your nose. I heard his gut make sounds like two kinds of jelly in the same jar wrestling each other. This is a good way to spend Halloween if you’re not giving Tootsie Rolls to little humans.

My head and belly have felt sick and scared-like today, sometimes. They were probably confused that I didn’t eat for almost 24 hours but that got solved so hey, what’s up?